Balanced Budget Amendment

WASHINGTON -- With help from Sen. Phil Gramm, the University of Texas at Austin this year was awarded a $6 million defense research grant for laboratory equipment that the Pentagon never requested.Through Mr. Gramm's work on the Senate Appropriations Committee, National Guard units in Texas this year are busy nTC renovating five armories and building two new ones -- work that the Pentagon doesn't want and says it doesn't need.A sampling of the fine print of this year's spending legislation shows that the conservative Republican from College Station and other Senate crusaders for fiscal restraint are unlikely to let ideology get in the way when it comes to government spending for the folks back home.

For six straight hours on July 19, Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen forcefully led the Democratic floor debate against passage of House Resolution 2560 - the "Cut, Cap, and Balance Act. " His biggest problem with the legislation was its requirement for a seemingly onerous balanced budget amendment. Mr. Van Hollen claimed he wasn't against "garden variety" balanced budget amendments - just this one, because it required limiting annual government spending to an insufficient 18 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product.

WASHINGTON -- Amid growing signs that a balanced-budget constitutional amendment could be approved this year, the Bush administration's budget director challenged the Democratic-controlled Congress yesterday to eliminate the $400 billion federal budget deficit by capping spending on mandatory federal programs.Richard G. Darman, director of the Office of Management and Budget, said that such a cap, coupled with a strong economic growth program, could eliminate the deficit and create a surplus as early as 1997.

WASHINGTON -- The noisy controversy over the balanced budget amendment is a classic example of American politics at its rock-bottom worst.The positions of Republicans and Democrats alike have been shot through with hyperbole and hypocrisy. The result has been the projection to the electorate of a radically misleading picture of what is at stake.All along supporters of the amendment have oversold it, suggesting that in itself it would offer a solution to the growing federal deficits. That is why it has been so popular -- backed by 79 percent of the voters in the most recent poll conducted for the New York Times.

WASHINGTON -- After the balanced budget amendment died in the Senate yesterday, federal workers may have been in the mood for a celebration. But the House still has to vote on the proposal that could cost government jobs."

Congress is now so discredited and dispirited as an institution that, in desperation, it may send to the states for ratification an amendment to the Constitution supposedly mandating a balanced budget. And, mind you, President Bush would sign such legislation even though he has never sent up a balanced budget and probably never will. This cynical, hypocritical gesture would be the final insult to voters from a bunch of politicians who are in the process of approving a $400 billion deficit -- the largest in U.S. history.

Last Sunday's column incorrectly listed votes from Maryland's House delegation on a tax bill (HR 831) that passed by a 381-44 vote. It would enable the self-employed to deduct 25 percent of health insurance premiums from taxable income. A yes vote was to pass the bill. The correct delegation votes:Y: YES N: NO X: NOT VOTINGY N X MemberY * * Ehrlich, Robert, R-2ndY * * Hoyer, Steny H. D-5thY * * Bartlett, Roscoe G., R-6th* N * Wynn, Albert R., D-4thY * * Cardin, Benjamin L., D-3rd* N * Mfume, Kweisi, D-7thY * * Gilchrest, Wayne T., R-1stY * * Morella, Constance A., R-8thHere is how members of Maryland's delegation on Capitol Hill were recorded on selected roll-call votes last week:Y: YES N: NO X: NOT VOTINGHOUSE: SMALL BUSINESSBy a 415-15 vote, the House passed a bill (HR 926)

THERE MAY or may not be good reasons for opposing the Balanced Budget Amendment, but the Democrats' favorite reasons are as phony as an eleven dollar bill.Democratic favorite objection #1: It's not necessary. Or as Sen. Edward M. Kennedy Sr. puts it, "I support a balanced budget, but I oppose a constitutional amendment. Congress doesn't have to amend the Constitution to balance the budget. All we have to do is make the difficult decisions needed to achieve that goal."All? All? He makes it sound so easy.

The proposed balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, defeated in the House of Representatives for all the wrong reasons, will come back like a bad penny next year unless Congress starts cutting deeply into the pending $400 billion deficit for all the right reasons.What could be the beginning of a rebellion against government spending started this past week. The House unexpectedly killed the $8.2 billion superconducting super collider and Democrats the next day accepted a $1.1 billion urban aid bill only half as large as they wanted.